A splendiferous wowzer.
In this superb companion tale to Cecil’s Lucy (2016), the worlds of a moviegoing girl, an audacious mouse, and a crafty cat mingle and clash in Bloomville.
It’s a Saturday afternoon. Drawn by the scent of popcorn, Iris Espinosa heads to the cinema, passing by a big cat “with six toes on each paw” and a stoop kid on her walk. Taking her place in “her usual seat” in the front row, the young girl sits enthralled by Robin Hood when a mouse with a popcorn-stuffed stomach approaches the adjacent seat. The mouse snuggles up to Iris—burrowing into Iris’ pocket—and ends up going home with her; she dubs the mouse Douglas in honor of her favorite actor. (Iris does not know that Douglas is, like her, female.) Now Douglas must brave the long journey—relatively speaking—back home to the cinema while eluding the hungry, terrible Six-Toed Cat, a master of patience “after so many years” of mouse-hunting experience. Similar to its beguiling predecessor, this adventure comes together in four acts full of quiet cliffhangers and thrilling mouse heroics. Cecil’s playful language and shifting third-person narration create contexts within contexts; each numbered chapter assumes the viewpoint of a character, major or minor, in ways readers might need rereads to fully appreciate. The artist’s duotone-spun, vintage artwork recalls the quaint splendors of yesteryear, peppered with minor visual gags and worldbuilding details. Primary human characters present white.
A splendiferous wowzer. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: Sept. 10, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-7636-3397-4
Page Count: 120
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: June 22, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2019
An immersive, charming read and convincing proof again that even small bodies can house stout hearts.
Can knightly deeds bring together a feathered odd couple who are on opposite daily schedules?
Having won over a dragon (and millions of fans) in the Caldecott Honor–winning Knight Owl (2022), the fierce yet impossibly cute nocturnal, armor-clad owlet faces a new challenge—sleep deprivation—in the wake of taking on Early Bird, a trainee who rises with the sun and chatters interminably: “I made pancakes! Do you like pancakes? I love pancakes! Where’s the syrup?” It’s enough to test the patience of even the knightliest of owls, and eventually Knight Owl explodes in anger. But although Early Bird is even smaller than her mentor, she turns out to be just as determined to achieve knighthood. After he tells her to leave, she acquits herself so nobly in a climactic encounter with a pack of wolves that she earns a place at the castle. Denise proves a dab hand at depicting genuinely slinky, scary wolves as well as slipping cheerfully anachronistic newspapers and other sight gags into his realistically wrought medieval settings to underscore the tale’s tongue-in-cheek tone. Better yet, a final view of the doughty duo sitting down together to a lavish pancake breakfast/dinner at dusk ends the episode in a sweet rush of syrup and bonhomie.
An immersive, charming read and convincing proof again that even small bodies can house stout hearts. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: Oct. 15, 2024
ISBN: 9780316564526
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Christy Ottaviano Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 5, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2025
As Captain Awesome would say, this kid is “MI-TEE!” (Fiction. 5-8)
The town of Sunnyview got a little bit safer when 8-year-old Eugene McGillicudy moved in.
Just like his comic-book mentor, Super Dude, Eugene, aka Captain Awesome, is on a one-man mission is to save the world from supervillains, like the nefarious “Queen Stinkypants from Planet Baby.” Just as Eugene suspected, plenty of new supervillains await him at Sunnyview Elementary. Are Meredith Mooney and the mind-reading Ms. Beasley secretly working together to try and force Eugene to reveal his secret identity? Will Principal Brick Foot succeed in throwing Captain Awesome into the “Dungeon of Detention?” Fortunately, Eugene isn’t forced to go it alone. Charlie Thomas Jones, fellow comic-book lover and Super Dude fan, stands ready and willing to help. When the class hamster goes missing, Captain Awesome must don his cape and, with the help of his new best friend, ride to the rescue. Kirby’s funny and engaging third-person narration and O’Connor’s hilarious illustrations make the book easily accessible and enormously appealing, particularly to readers who have recently graduated to chapter books. But it is the quirky, mischievous Eugene that really makes this book special. His energy and humor are contagious, and his dogged commitment to his superhero alter ego is enough to make anyone a believer.
As Captain Awesome would say, this kid is “MI-TEE!” (Fiction. 5-8)Pub Date: April 3, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-4424-4090-6
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Little Simon/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Jan. 17, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2012
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